Papillary Thyroid Carcinoma
If you're friends with me elsewhere (Ravelry or Facebook) you've already seen this, but for my LJ-only friends, here it is:
I have thyroid cancer.
It's a small, early stage papillary carcinoma, which is not aggressive and is very easy to treat, especially in someone my age. It's also the most common type of thyroid cancer, and apparently pathologists see it "like 100 times a day". I knew when we found the nodule that there was a 1/20 chance of it being cancer, but I had myself mostly convinced that it was just a cyst ... nope! But I've been assured that I'm going to be totally fine, because this cancer in people like me gets completely cured with only surgery around 95% of the time.
So what will happen is I'm going to have a near-total thyroidectomy, to remove the tumor and pretty much all of the rest of my thyroid too. While she's in there, the surgeon will probably poke around a little just to check that the cancer didn't get into my lymph nodes. If it did, I might have another surgery, or I might have to do a radio-iodine ablation to kill off all the remaining thyroid cells in my body. However, this seems very unlikely. (Which is actually a little disappointing, because I was sort of looking forward to being radioactive! But it's also good because then I don't have to go on a special diet and be off the hormones and then get quarantined.) I'm not sure how long recovering from the surgery will take (I meet my surgeon on Monday), but if I did radio iodine it would be a few months later, and require two weeks of prep and a week or two of keeping away from people so I don't irradiate them. NOT FUN!
The most likely outcome is that after my surgery, I will be cured! I will have to take thyroid hormone pills for the rest of my life, and I'll have to get checked annually (probably with ultrasound and blood work) to be sure that nothing is re-growing or otherwise acting oddly. Not too bad! People without thyroids live exactly the same sorts of lives as people who have them, with only the addition of one daily pill and an additional doctor appointment every year.
I saw my endocrinologist today and he answered all of my questions (which were plentiful). He can't categorize the stage of my cancer, but it's probably stage 1a, or maaaaaybe 1b. My tumor is egg-shaped and 1.2 cm long, in the right lobe of my thyroid. Since this cancer grows so slowly, he guessed that it's been there for at least five years. It's possible it might not have been found until it was much larger, but depending on the size my prognosis could still be as good as it is right now.
The recommended treatment for me is to remove the entire thyroid except for little bits of tissue, which are left because if you try to get them there's a high risk of damage to the nerves that control your larynx, which you need to talk and, you know, breathe. In some cases (more severe than mine) radioactive iodine treatment is used to kill off the remaining thyroid cells in the neck, and anywhere else the cancer might have spread. This used to be common practice, but he said that new studies are showing that it's not really necessary in a lot of cases.
So anyway, that's essentially what there is to know about my cancer. I am doing fine, and feeling very positive and optimistic. It was tough right after the diagnosis (a phone call on my lunch hour -- IT SUCKED) and Erik is still a little freaked, but we know that everything will be fine, and we're very lucky that I'm insured. Hopefully in just a few months, I'll be able to count myself among the thousands of CURED survivors of papillary thyroid carcinoma!
I have thyroid cancer.
It's a small, early stage papillary carcinoma, which is not aggressive and is very easy to treat, especially in someone my age. It's also the most common type of thyroid cancer, and apparently pathologists see it "like 100 times a day". I knew when we found the nodule that there was a 1/20 chance of it being cancer, but I had myself mostly convinced that it was just a cyst ... nope! But I've been assured that I'm going to be totally fine, because this cancer in people like me gets completely cured with only surgery around 95% of the time.
So what will happen is I'm going to have a near-total thyroidectomy, to remove the tumor and pretty much all of the rest of my thyroid too. While she's in there, the surgeon will probably poke around a little just to check that the cancer didn't get into my lymph nodes. If it did, I might have another surgery, or I might have to do a radio-iodine ablation to kill off all the remaining thyroid cells in my body. However, this seems very unlikely. (Which is actually a little disappointing, because I was sort of looking forward to being radioactive! But it's also good because then I don't have to go on a special diet and be off the hormones and then get quarantined.) I'm not sure how long recovering from the surgery will take (I meet my surgeon on Monday), but if I did radio iodine it would be a few months later, and require two weeks of prep and a week or two of keeping away from people so I don't irradiate them. NOT FUN!
The most likely outcome is that after my surgery, I will be cured! I will have to take thyroid hormone pills for the rest of my life, and I'll have to get checked annually (probably with ultrasound and blood work) to be sure that nothing is re-growing or otherwise acting oddly. Not too bad! People without thyroids live exactly the same sorts of lives as people who have them, with only the addition of one daily pill and an additional doctor appointment every year.
I saw my endocrinologist today and he answered all of my questions (which were plentiful). He can't categorize the stage of my cancer, but it's probably stage 1a, or maaaaaybe 1b. My tumor is egg-shaped and 1.2 cm long, in the right lobe of my thyroid. Since this cancer grows so slowly, he guessed that it's been there for at least five years. It's possible it might not have been found until it was much larger, but depending on the size my prognosis could still be as good as it is right now.
The recommended treatment for me is to remove the entire thyroid except for little bits of tissue, which are left because if you try to get them there's a high risk of damage to the nerves that control your larynx, which you need to talk and, you know, breathe. In some cases (more severe than mine) radioactive iodine treatment is used to kill off the remaining thyroid cells in the neck, and anywhere else the cancer might have spread. This used to be common practice, but he said that new studies are showing that it's not really necessary in a lot of cases.
So anyway, that's essentially what there is to know about my cancer. I am doing fine, and feeling very positive and optimistic. It was tough right after the diagnosis (a phone call on my lunch hour -- IT SUCKED) and Erik is still a little freaked, but we know that everything will be fine, and we're very lucky that I'm insured. Hopefully in just a few months, I'll be able to count myself among the thousands of CURED survivors of papillary thyroid carcinoma!